


Vibe Check

by Snowy_Rain



Series: Dracken Academy (Because Hogwarts Is A Disgusting Name) [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Assassination Attempt(s), Fix-It of Sorts, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Its.... not exactly slow burn but to say more would be unsolicited spoiler, Just know that it is Extensive, Misunderstandings, Otome game au, Possibly Graphic Descriptions of Violence, Reincarnation, Slow Burn, Takes inspiration from the worldbuilding of another fic I'm planning, The Tedium of The Ministry, Wizarding Mafia, it deserves a tag of its own
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-21
Updated: 2021-02-10
Packaged: 2021-03-04 17:47:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 18,570
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25430371
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snowy_Rain/pseuds/Snowy_Rain
Summary: After a fatal car accident, Harry Evans finds himself in his newly released dating simulator. The body he's occupying? The villain: HarryfuckingPotter
Relationships: Harry Potter & Tom Riddle, Harry Potter & Various People, Harry Potter/Tom Riddle
Series: Dracken Academy (Because Hogwarts Is A Disgusting Name) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1841965
Comments: 45
Kudos: 108





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> This will be a long fic, probably longer than 30k? I don't even know, but it's very plot-heavy. I'm stressed because of school so I can't stick to an update schedule these days. (WILL be completed. one day.)

Let’s agree on something.

Making up strange dreams about being whisked away to distant lands by your soccer player crush is normal when you are fourteen, on the cusp of puberty, just starting to grow out of playing with plastic ponies. Getting into Japanese dating simulations to get over a celebrity crush on Victor Krum is perfectly acceptable. Hell, Harry’s parents had probably been  _ expecting  _ it. Announcing loudly to the whole first grade classroom that he wanted Dennis Fawley to be his boyfriend probably hadn’t been very straight. He was sure that playing girly games hadn’t even made his parents blink.

Sure, pining over fictional characters drawn in manga styles at eighteen years old had been a bit weird, but nothing to raise an eyebrow at. Letting that obsession persist throughout his whole college life, however?

_ That  _ should have been his first clue. If he had noticed it then, he could have had a chance to escape this hobby.

Spending his whole computer programming courses playing around, writing codes for dating simulations had probably been telling of his current issues. Collaborating with Arts major Ronald Weasley to create a dating simulator had been the straw that broke the camel’s back.

There had been absolutely  _ no  _ going back.

“Harry, I think you’re overreacting,” Lily Evans, his divorced mother said. Harry sniffed into his paper napkin. “I played the Beta game. It was amazing. I even told Sev to play it - granted, he refused, but I think he’s been playing it during recess. I’ve seen him snickering at the memes.”

“That doesn’t mean  _ anything  _ Mom, Snape’s an asshole. Horrible games deserve asshole players.”

“He’s practically your second father, Harry; I think he is well past the asshole step-parent stage.”

Yeah, well, Sirius being his godfather, it had been ingrained in Harry to wince whenever Severus entered the room.

“Did you invite your father and Sirius to the Beta? Or the others?” Lily asked.

Harry shook his head. “Nah.”

“Please do. They’ll like it, I promise.”

“Seriously?”

_ “Yes.  _ It’s a good game, Harry. You and Ron did an awesome job.”

After the farewell pleasantries were exchanged, Harry ended the call and wrapped himself in a blanket burrito, sniffling into the soft fabric. It was a birthday gag gift from Ron, who had bought it joking that now he could bring a pillow everywhere to sleep. Harry had taken the blanket and literally brought it to Java class and fallen asleep on it.

Making the game had been difficult. It had required a lot more collaborating than just the brainstorming he did with Ron. He had needed to find someone who could handle advertising, then he had needed to find some funds (which had come from a friend of Ron’s, Drake Mallory, whom Harry had thanked by giving him his own character in the game,  _ Draco Malfoy),  _ someone who would help with the game mechanics, someone who was good at graphic design, and so on and on. Networking was hard.

But Harry wasn’t a quitter. Today was the final day, the day when the game would be finally up on game stores… Yeah. He was stressing out pretty badly. He hadn’t had to call his mom since years ago, when he had been hyperventilating because of a missed project deadline… But regardless of how much of an anxiety-ridden adult he was, he would be seeing this project through. There was no space for quitters in the world.

He unwrapped himself from the blanket burrito to check on his inbox, finding messages from various colleagues and mentors. He smiled at Dumbledore’s smiley face, sent with a brief yet effective  _ ‘The world needs more people like you, Harry.’ _

From the corner of his eyes, Harry saw Hermione profile picture light up, signalling a new message. He opened it curiously.

_ ‘Harry,’  _ it said.  _ ‘I think you should come into the office. We found a nasty software bug in the twenty-third level. It crashes the whole application.’ _

Oh. A bug.

_ Oh. _

Had someone been watching Harry’s apartment from the cafe across the street, they would have been startled to see a grown-man flail out of the entrance and fly into the traffic, jacket hanging half-worn from one shoulder, shoes worn in reverse. Harry ran as fast as his legs could carry him, cursing once again his lack of a private vehicle - or if he even had had one, the existence of traffic. He supposed he could have taken a bus, but a bus would  _ stop  _ and take way too many detours. As it was, running the whole way like a madman was a better alternative.

He paused at the lights to take a much-needed breather for his heaving, overworked lungs and trembling legs.  _ I should exercise more,  _ went through his mind before he noticed the green, flickering light and rushed into the crosswalk.

_ “HARRY!” _

Harry made a move to turn around.

Sweat dripped down his temple. He saw the truck. He saw the pedestrians scatter.

He stood deaf and paralyzed as the truck hit his body. The force rippled through his body like a sledgehammer.

The next few seconds were strange. He could distantly hear voices - familiar and unfamiliar - and he could feel light touches against his skin, far away.

It was dark. Bells tolled behind his ears, the ringing tingling and pitter-patter.

***

The bells were more tangible, but somehow even further. It felt as though the sound was coming through a wall, like the tolling of a church bell rather than the little, market-bought types. 

Harry was struck awake by his heart beat. He shot up with a choking gasp, eyes snapping open suddenly.

“Harry! For Merlin’s sake, lie back down!” someone exclaimed, pushing him down by his shoulders. Harry tried to weakly grab those hands, but his fingers could not curl well. He let the woman position him on the soft bed, putting a careful hand on his forehead.

“You’re burning up,” she said. “Goodness… Why did this have to happen now? We have enough trouble with the Lord and Lady right now.”

_ Lord, lady,  _ Harry repeated in his mind, feeling sluggish. “Who-?”

“Rest, dear, you’ll be better in the morning.”

_ Rest… I don’t want to sleep again. Dark, it’s dark inside…  _

He fell asleep.

***

The next time Harry woke, it was out of the blue, without a transition from deep sleep to awakeness, and the utter certainty that something was wrong.

“I heard the wards ringing!” a familiar voice called, making Harry turn his head toward the door. “Are you awake, Harry?”

_ No,  _ Harry thought with a little horror, staring eyes wide as the door opened.  _ It can’t be- _

But Mrs. Weasley was there, as pink-cheeked and plump as she always was. But Harry knew that this couldn’t be the Molly Weasley he knew, because he had-  _ he had- _

_ I’m dead, _ he remembered. His body tensed like a taut wire, trembling with the threat of breaking. He couldn’t stray his eyes from the woman’s visage, as impossible as it was. “Mrs. Weasley-”

“I told you, dear; call me Molly. I’m your  _ maid,  _ not your aunt.” She moved to his bedside table, opening a drawer and giving him a -  _ a phial?  _ “Drink up! You need a Pepper-Up after that nasty fever.”

_ Pepper-Up… Fucking  _ **_Pepper-Up._ **

Now… Normally, Harry wouldn’t need to have a breakdown over a weird name.  _ Normally _ , an ordinary adult Harry Evans wouldn’t have needed to know that name. (Well,  _ normally,  _ people would fucking  _ stay dead.) _ But Harry had spent half his life building a story world with magic, and so naturally, he knew that name.

It was a potion, existing solely in his dating simulator, the one he had written himself.

He looked at the phial of effervescent liquid, then stared at the character he had created for Mrs. Weasley.

_ Fuck. _


	2. Early Plans

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry has to deal with difficult emotions too quickly. Instead, he focuses on saving his parents from the law.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I.... have no idea how I wrote 6k in one day.
> 
> Consider this a miracle. (But know that each chapter will be between 6k and 9k.

This was a nightmare scenario. Harry Evans remembered the countless reincarnation stories he read, the endless flood of  _ protagonist jumps dimensions  _ storylines that had bored him out of his mind in the end. The trope was faulty by  _ itself -  _ there was no rhyme nor reason to it; one person couldn’t save the world just by their existence, neither could one person be  _ special  _ enough to be sent to another plane because  _ nobody was special.  _ The love interests would inevitably fall for the heroine or the hero and it would be because  _ they were unlike any other they had seen -  _ ha.

Don’t make him laugh.  _ Nobody was special enough for that.  _ The only way he could justify in those storylines was… well, now that he thought about it, he  _ couldn’t  _ find anything to justify their existence. They were staples because they were easy entertainment and satisfied the masses of bored people.

_ So… why was he here? _

“Eat up, you’re practically falling asleep on me,” Molly complained, cleaning the room with her wand. Harry couldn’t help but stare in awe at the displays of magic, eating as slowly as possible.

He was… feeling slightly numb. It might be the shock of dying and coming back. He forcibly released a breath and shoved the spoonful of oatmeal into his mouth.

“Do you feel better? I can change the bedding, or the pillow maybe.”

“This is okay,” he said, realizing then that his voice sounded unfairly young. He clamped his mouth shut, gazing wide eyed at the hands holding his spoon.

_ That’s not my hand,  _ he thought, inhaling tremulously. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Are you quite sure? Also, if you need more food-”

“Why am I here?” he asked, interrupting her. Seeing how startled she looked, he reworded the question, “I mean, where are - where are my parents?”

Molly’s face fell, and suddenly there was another bad feeling deep in his guts.

“Oh,” she intoned softly. Averting her eyes, the woman bit her lips and sighed. “You don’t remember the raid. That’s… That’s good.”

_ Good? What raid? _

“I want to know, I have to-”

“I think not, Young Master,” Molly put her foot down quite firmly. “I’m afraid there is nothing to be done about it. The case was open and close.”

“What  _ case?”  _ he asked, incensed. “I have a  _ right  _ to know!”

Molly glanced back at him, eyes sorrowful. “Well… You do. I’m sorry, it’s just-” She stopped and closed her eyes, taking a few deep breaths. A sudden breeze passed through her hair. “I’m sorry, Harry. You need to know this too. I forgot my place for a moment.”

“It’s nothing, just tell me-”

“Yes,” Molly continued, cleaning her throat. She turned back to him with misty eyes and said, “The Lord and Lady are incarcerated.”

_ Imprisoned? _

“Why?” he asked, befuddled. Why would his parents be-?

Abruptly, he remembered the world and his situation hit him in the guts, clearing his mind.

_ He was Harry Potter right now. _

It made  _ sense _ , something he needed direly at that moment. He had outlined the backstory painstakingly, not even letting a single discrepancy linger. Harry Potter, the scion of the Potter family would be orphaned suddenly by the death sentence of his parents, who had been wrongfully imprisoned to cover up another family’s mistakes - as a result, Harry Potter had been vengeful and angry at the world, a disturbed individual who would grow up to become a fearsome terrorist trying to overthrow the government.

The main antagonist of the story.

_ Fuck,  _ he thought repeatedly, frozen on autopilot as he clutched Molly’s callused hands.  _ Fuck fuck fuck fuck  _ **_fuck-_ **

_ That  _ was why he had been reincarnated as Harry Potter. For  _ god’s sake,  _ Harry had modeled the character after  _ himself,  _ so that he could have some fun as another persona.

_ Fuck that. What the hell kind of excuse is  _ **_having fun?_ ** _ Had I known- _

Had he known, Harry probably wouldn’t have  _ made  _ the game at all. This wasn’t the right way to think. He had to think of a solution-

“I’ll go and do the laundry,” Molly informed him, wiping her eyes with a napkin and standing up. She bowed low - which surprised Harry enough to jolt him out of his thoughts - and left the room without fanfare.

_ Fuck. _

Harry took his head in his hands, absolutely hopeless. This was a shitty situation no matter where he looked at it from. In a short while, his parents would be hanged and he would be all alone in the world again, not dead yet  _ not happy either.  _ It was selfish - it was against the storyline - but he didn’t want to lose his parents.

Tears gathered at the rims of his eyes, and he sniffled on his knees, smearing the salty wetness around the fabric as he shook his head side to side. He hated not being dead for a short moment, but shivered in memory of that darkness and  _ thanked  _ his luck that he wasn’t dead.

_ The world needs more people like you,  _ he remembered out of the blue. He opened his eyes to stare at the damp fabric of his trousers, and Dumbledore’s voice echoed in his ears,  _ You have what it takes to change the world. _

Did he?

He put his chin on his knees, glaring at the wall opposite of him. Countless images burned in his mind, from potential plot holes to backstory details. If he could save his parents… he would have to completely destroy the plot.

_ Is that it?  _ he wondered, heart racing.  _ If I do it right, if I can compile the whole story as I remember it... _

He had a fighting chance. There was no place for quitters in this world, so he wouldn’t give up - not when he wasn’t sure that he had lost.

He needed paper and pen.

***

This was…  _ harder  _ than he had thought it would be. The big details had come readily, but the little ones came and went as they pleased. Harry already circled at least ten dates as  _ ‘uncertain’.  _

He clearly remembered the obvious details, however.

The Gaunt family, being inbred and deficient in the brain department, had lost all their money because of either poor management, bad investment or gambling. Seeing the difficult times ahead, they had -  _ ahem  _ \- allowed their daughter Merope Gaunt to bed the young and handsome Lord Riddle, for the money. It was common knowledge that the Riddles were infertile, so they had adopted an heir from one of the dying magical bloodlines. Seeing as he couldn’t sire a child, Lord Riddle had used poor Merope as a common whore.

From those unions, however, had sprung up Tom Riddle - Merope and Lord Riddle’s son. The Gaunts were an old Pureblood family, so they offered a deal to the Riddles to keep the scandal hush-hush.

The Gaunts would keep the existence of the boy hidden. In exchange, the Riddles would help the Gaunts cover up some of their worst crimes - including human sacrifice, organ trafficking and Dark Magic activity. They had done so, at the price of bringing down an innocent family: The Potters.

Admittedly, when Harry had written that, he hadn’t been thinking with a sound mind. Drunkenness and Ron’s encouragement had played a large role in it. Come morning, however, he had been already too attached to the plot to throw it away. So he had decided that he would keep some of the more grotesque details to special lore giveaways in the future, where overly curious players could buy them and write them into internet forums.

This, however, complicated his plans a bit.

If the Gaunts heard of his efforts, they would inform the Riddles and Harry would be shut down pretty quickly. The Riddles were a prominent  _ Muggle  _ family - as in, they didn’t have magic - and they had money but no real influence. It was unlikely that they had agents in the Ministry of Magic.

The Gaunts, however, probably had a few allies situated in the shadows. The Dark Pureblood families were a close-knit community, preferring to socialize with each other instead of those outside their circles. If Harry took the bureaucratic route - that is, the legal one - he would only have reasonable trouble.

But if he took the illegal route… Would that be better? He could hire someone to take his parents out of Azkaban - the wizard prison - but that would mean that his parents would have to live the rest of their lives as fugitives, constantly running away from the law despite being innocent.

_ Sirius,  _ he remembered suddenly, something crushing his heart.  _ He’s in prison too. _

Connected to the Potters by proxy, the Ministry had taken Sirius in for trial too. Seeing as the Ministry was corrupt, however, the chances were he would be hanged alongside them.

_ Harry Potter,  _ sizzling with the need for revenge, with no one to soothe his wrath. He had really been dealt a bad hand.

Harry was determined to turn this story into a happy one.

So he wrote down his current plans and circled the ones he wasn’t sure about. The first plan was to interrogate the servants without letting Molly know - she would think he was too young - and finding out any correspondence with magical signatures. Blood seals would work too, but those were a bit shady and might instead lead to the Potters being condemned for using Dark Magic. Doing it without harming anyone wasn’t illegal, but it wasn’t lauded either.

So, the first thing to do would be finding alibis. There was a low chance of one being present in the house, but Harry needed to do it for his peace of mind.

The second thing on his list was finding out the date for the hanging. He needed to know the time frame he was working with, see which plans would work with his deadline, and then plan around those dates. Depending on that… he might need to prioritise which he wanted to save more, Sirius or his parents.

He loved both, but one was better than none. If everything here was as he had imagined it, that would mean that the relationship dynamics were the same as they were back in his own world. And  _ that  _ would mean that his father and Sirius Black loved each other, and that his mother still pined after her childhood friend. He didn’t want to separate them, but he needed to save all he could.

Granted, this was only if he was able to win a single case.

There was also the chance that if he could save Sirius, he could help Harry postpone the hanging further. From Molly’s words, he knew that right now it was the morning after the “raid”. If he worked fast, he might be able to time everything right. There was also the advantage of Sirius not being a - he glanced at a wardrobe mirror and estimated - ten-ish-year-old child.

He needed to snoop around.

***

Molly was apparently the head maid. The Weasley brood was a middle-class family of magicals, the elder sons working in their respective fields after graduating from Dracken Academy, the school for mages. Arthur Weasley, the father, was a Ministry employee in the Department of Illegal Modification, which dealt with untethered enchantments bleeding into the enchanted objects and making them sentient. It was a gruelling job, but rather important so it was a source of pride for the family. The twins, Fred and George, were studying at Dracken Academy while the youngest pair - who were Ron and his younger sister Ginny - were still waiting to get their invitations to the school.

He could parse from the other maids’ words that because of the Lord and Lady’s abrupt incarceration, Molly had been a bit too unwell to perform her duties. The girls asked for his forgiveness and promised that she would be up by tomorrow.

“It’s no problem,” he told them truthfully. Really, it was actually very beneficial to his plan, but he couldn’t say that to them could he? “She can rest as much as she wants. She’s been working hard, hasn’t she?”

“Yes, Young Master,” the one with blonde hair responded. She seemed kind of blue, but she could put on a smile very effectively. “Why don’t we bring you breakfast up here? You can stay in your room if you don’t feel well.”

“Um, no, thank you,” he said. If he got stuck here all day, he might be liable to do something reckless. “I’ll come down. Let me dress.”

The maids bowed and exited the room. Harry was glad that he had at least had the common sense to know that a boy of ten would be able to dress himself. He stripped out of his wrinkly pajamas and threw open the wardrobe, sighing in relief at the modest clothes. At least it didn’t seem like the Potters were snobs. Then again, if this was like real life, they wouldn’t be.

He shook his head and took out one he liked. It was black and looked comfortable, so he supposed he could wear it to a casual breakfast. Oh god - was there a dress code for mealtimes? Harry fervently wished that there wasn’t, if only to skip that unpleasantness.

Once he was dressed and ready to go, he opened the door and entered the hallway.

Potter Manor was a quaint cottage, with tasteful decorations lining the corridors are rooms with cozy furniture. Harry wanted to explore the place, but he was quite hungry and he needed to fish for information. He went downstairs and found the two maids waiting for him.

“Am I late?” he asked, a bit nervous to have people at his whim. “I didn’t mean to-”

“Oh, no, of course not,” the black haired one answered, blinking. Harry  _ really  _ needed to learn their names. “It’s  _ your  _ meal. You can come down whenever you want to, Young Master. Did you forget?”

_ Ah, fuck,  _ Harry thought again, masking it with a shy turn of his lips. “Sorry, I’ve been out of it, a bit.”

The maids exchanged an uneasy look, seemingly sighing inwardly. Harry hoped that he could squeeze them dry of information, so that he could find the evidence he needed - if that didn’t work, he could always use the authority he guessed he had, since he had never seen the maids too intimidated by him.  _ That,  _ however, might be because he was a child.

He was led to the dinner table - which wasn’t very grand, to his relief - and shown a wide variety of sugary, delicious foods. Pancakes with bacon on the side, fruits and melted chocolate, some greens at the side for a healthy diet he supposed, and a few other sides that made his mouth water.

_ No, focus,  _ he told himself. He hadn’t thought that being reverted back to a child would bring back childish urges, but apparently it had. “So, how have you been?”

“Hm?” the blonde one hummed questioningly. “Oh -  _ me?” _

“Yes, why not?”

She seemed a bit speechless, but spoke nonetheless, “I’m fine, honestly. It’s a beautiful day, the sun was out today and the laundry was already done when I woke up - like I said, it’s been all right.”

“The debacle with the Lord and Lady has been stressing,” the black haired one said, much to the disapproving glance of the other. “We’ve been doing our best, but I can’t say that it hasn’t been tiring. The Aurors coming in and out is also a burden, what with their rudeness.”

“Shelly-”

“What?” She raised an eyebrow at her blonde friend. “It’s not like he was asking how your day went, Maggie.”

“Well, you didn’t need to tell him  _ everything!” _

“I want to know,” Harry interjected, trying to keep the peace. “I  _ have  _ to know. I need to know everything about it - can you please tell me? I don’t want to try to force you into giving the information I want, so can you?”

Shelly narrowed his eyes at him but sighed at last, giving up. “After breakfast,” she said. “Breakfast is an important meal. Eat up.”

Maggie grumbled beside her, looking quite uncomfortable, but she didn’t leave or complain about his inappropriate interest. Harry gobbled up the rest of his meal with relieved hunger, filling his stomach until it couldn’t bear more sugar.

“Now,” Shelly announced, standing up and dusting her apron. “Let us go into the Lady’s study. I suspect you have many questions.”

“Many,” Harry confirmed, nodding along.

They climbed two sets of stairs, passing through one hidden passage behind a mirror and another one hidden under a magical trapdoor, seemingly warded against entry.

“Trusted maids have the key to the ward,” Maggie told him as Shelly opened the ward with a series of chants. “The Lady thought that there might be untrustworthy people in the house.”

“Did she really,” Harry muttered under his breath as the door opened, revealing a ladder diving deep into the darkness. “That looks pretty horrifying. Are we sure there aren’t monsters here?”

“Seventy percent sure,” Shelly replied before Maggie could intervene, not helping Harry’s anxiety at all. “But don’t worry, we are capable of fighting most creatures with malicious intent.”

“Half of us is capable,” Maggie corrected, gripping Harry’s wrist firmly. She led him into the tunnel. “Come on, Young Master. Hold it tight-”

They descended down the ladder into the viscous darkness, until they couldn’t see the light above anymore.

Maggie sighed. “Close the gate.”

Harry felt a tiny zephyr against his face, and there was a sudden sound of hardwood against wood, when the lights suddenly turned on.

They were in a study room with walls lined with shelves reaching to the ceiling, filled with books to the smallest crevice, with some cabinets standing at the corners like filing closets from offices. There was a ladder laid against the farthest wall, and a large desk in the middle of the room.

“The Lady’s study,” Shelly introduced and turned to Harry, “I don’t suppose you’ve been here before?”

“No, never,” Harry answered, looking around in wonder. “This is so  _ cool.” _

Maggie laughed beside him. “Well, you got what you wanted, I suppose.”

Shelly took the reins and brought him straight to the desk, where stacks of parchment resided. Harry was surprised to discover that the texture was gritty and not smooth at all, and much thicker than paper.

“These are letters the Lady wrote to Lord Potter and Lord Black,” the maid told him. “I assume you are interested in these. They were sent back almost immediately after receiving, so I think they might be important documents.”

“You didn’t check?” Harry asked, confused.

Shelly shrugged. “There was no need to, before. We left them alone. Before you asked to know what happened, they didn’t even occur to me.”

Together - once Maggie had given up on stopping them and joined instead - they went through huge stacks of letters and legal documents, most of them making Harry’s head hurt. Shelly took over for him once she noticed the crease between his eyebrows, and made him rest against his will.

“I’ll fire you,” Harry threatened futilely. Both of them knew that he wouldn’t. “This is harassment.”

Shelly snorted and gave him an unsympathetic look. “If that’s harassment, I’m scared of what you would call the real harassment.”

_ “Please  _ don’t encourage him,” Maggie chimed in. The constant research and review had visibly tired her out. Harry wondered if she was more used to manual labor and chores than the academic stuff, which might be why she had a job in the Potter Manor. Harry had half a mind to ask her, but he couldn’t bring himself to care enough about it. He felt drained enough to sleep here, on the uncomfortable floor, but Shelly’s ardent search kept him awake. 

“Give me the ones you think are relevant,” he told her, too tired to read the rest of the parchments. “You’d think  _ mages  _ would have better sorting systems.”

“Shut up,” Shelly mumbled half-heartedly, eyes darting all over and skimming the document. “Magic can’t help you find what’s relevant, Young Master. And anyway - these are traditionally written letters and files, so we can’t really put  _ scrolls  _ into the cabinets, can we?”

“You could - I don’t know - put the scrolls into bottles and label them,” he said.

Maggie frowned. “That’s actually a good idea. We could do that.”

_ “After  _ this is over, of course,” the other girl said, and that was the end of it. 

Nearly an hour later, Shelly sent a flying paper plane message to the top of the ladder. It was probably to alert the other maids that they were safe and in the Manor, so that they wouldn’t fall prey to panic and call the Aurors. Harry found himself liking the girl a lot - she was level headed and disciplined, which made working with her easier. Maggie wasn’t bad either - she was a bit of a worrywart, but she was all too willing to let them to their own devices; after making sure safety wasn’t an issue, of course.

It was nearly eight in the evening when they stopped. What they found from the documents was pretty substantial. Harry categorized them all in two stacks named  _ ‘might be evidence’  _ and  _ ‘probably not evidence’.  _ In the first pile were two letters from Sirius, one of which might be able to prove his innocence - as it was stamped with his family coat of arms, which might count as a magical signature. Additionally, there was a heavily coded letter that Shelly had been able to crack after an hour of intense staring and mumbling, which basically implied that there were enemies of Potters who would be willing to bring them down. There was a small remark that Harry thought he could use to accuse the Gaunts, but it wasn’t  _ evidence _ .

“Shelly,” Maggie spoke with urgency, nudging her. “Look at this one-”

A paper letter, written with a messy scrawl, the date scribbled at the topmost right corner like an afterthought. Harry snatched it out of her hand and skimmed through it.

_ Compromised,  _ read the letter,  _ I was fooled. The snakes on drugs were probably in cohorts with the mystery guys. The law is coming after me and you - I fucking SWEAR on my father and blood, may lightning strike me and I die, I didn’t do it, any of the shady stuff- _

At the very bottom, there was his name, and a smear of dirty brown.  _ Sirius Black. _

“He bled onto the paper,” Maggie whispered furiously, “he sent his  _ confession!” _

“No,” Harry denied, the girls turning to look at him. “He sent his  _ evidence.” _

“What-?”

“Sirius sent his evidence to my parents - he invoked a vow, so he could prove his innocence-” He shook his head, a migraine building behind his skull. “But he didn’t write their names.  _ Why?” _

“There is a spell that lets you know if a letter contains key words,” Shelly said. “You can incorporate it into home wards and prevent mail from leaving. It’s a popular filtering method, used by celebrities and high profile people.”

“Then he knew who they were,” Harry said with a finality. “The snakes on drugs- and the mystery guys- they could have surrounded him and then put those wards around the perimeter.” He had a pretty good guess as to who they were, but he wasn’t sure if he could prove their guilt.

And furthermore, why hadn’t his parents sent the letter to the Ministry? Had they been ambushed as well? So seeing as they were trapped, Lily had hidden the letter… But that didn’t make much sense either. Why hide it when you had evidence of a meddlesome foe?

No matter - that wasn’t vital information. What Harry needed was things that would help with Sirius and his parents’ case.

“It’s odd that the Lady hid the letter instead of handing it in to the Ministry,” Maggie spoke, “but it’s very late. We should retire to our beds, Young Master - as should you. You are too young to spend long hours poring over these-” She gestured to the messy study.  _ “-this.” _

“I’m afraid I have to agree with her,” Shelly said. “It’s your bedtime. We have time until the ha- the trial,” she replaced the word, displaying  _ some  _ sensitivity. Harry yawned and let the girls help him up the metal ladder.

Once he was back in his room, he realized that he was awfully thirsty and hungry - spending over twelve hours in a secret underground room was probably the reason. He asked for some snacks and two tall glasses of water - it would probably be enough - and went to bed with a heavy mind and heavy stomach.

***

The next morning, he felt the exhaustion of the previous day bog down on him like a hulking, ominous giant. He could barely focus on any documents, which made Maggie reprimand him for forcing himself.

“I’m fine,” he said for the nth time. “Quit nagging me. It’s annoying and no one likes that.”

“Hey,” Shelly warned him, scowling. “That’s rude.”

“It’s okay,” the other maid waved it away. “I’m used to kids snapping at me. I used to deal with  _ five  _ other children back home.”

“I’m sorry,” Harry conceded, because Maggie didn’t deserve his rudeness. He rubbed his eyes and heaved a breath. “It’s just… It’s been difficult. I don’t think I got enough sleep.”

“That’s why I’m telling you to take it easy, Young Master,” she said, “so you can help us properly. Do it for the Lord and Lady, if you don’t care about yourself. I’m sure they’d be sad to learn that their son worked himself to a coma.”

“Well, if you insist,” Harry huffed and stood up from the scratchy carpet, aligning a few parchments in his hands. He handed them over to Shelly, who took them with a gracious embrace. “Please take care of these for me. I need to go over them later.”

“Of course. Please rest.”

“Good luck to you both.”

He gave the girls a wave before climbing out of the trapdoor, wiping his forehead and marvelling at the amount of sweat. The room was a reasonable temperature - was his fever coming back? Harry certainly hadn’t helped it by spending the whole day working yesterday.

_ Maybe I should actually take a break,  _ he thought, actually considering it for the first time.  _ This won’t help anyone. _

He decided to go upstairs and review his list of plans, but the moment his bum hit the soft mattress, a wave of lethargy hit him.

_ Fuck,  _ he thought, which was becoming a habit.  _ Okay. Review later, sleep first. _

***

When he woke up, it was dark outside. Harry looked around disoriented, wondering when he had slept. It felt more like a blink between one breath and the next.

He looked out of the window and narrowed his eyes at a pair of Aurors standing aimlessly. Or were they there to keep an eye out on the property? That was more likely. He crept out of his bed and wore a short robe - the long ones were just awkward, who had designed these monstrosities?

_ There it is,  _ he sighed in relief.  _ The plan list. Let’s see… _

The next bullet point in the list was asking someone about the date of the death sentence. Harry needed to take care of that quickly. Taking one day to let his body recover was okay, but taking more than that wasn’t good. He had a limited amount of time to expose the Gaunts - and even worse, that amount of time was unknown to him.

_ I could ask Molly,  _ he analyzed,  _ but will she tell me the date? She might lie to me because of my age. But if I confront her directly… _

He was loath to admit it, but Mrs Weasley had always been straightforward when she had been under stress. Intimidation was something he wasn’t good at, but he could improve. For his parents’ and Sirius’ sake.

So it was with that mind when he asked a random maid for the directions to the head maid’s room, which was described to him with a nervous stutter. Harry arrived at the location to find the door left ajar, light coming through.

“I’m sorry, I don’t know anything about this,” Molly said, voice fatigued and worn down with worries. “Please, can’t you leave the Manor? There is nothing else to find here. Everyone’s been sick with the investigation, and the butler told me that you’ve already searched every room - even the Young Master’s!”

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” the man - the  _ Auror,  _ Harry noticed - told her, sounding quite weary himself. “I’m required to talk to everyone in the house, lest my superior sends me back with a formal reprimand. Since Lord and Lady Potter are...  _ distinguished  _ people, we have to be as thorough as possible.”

Harry entered the room. The sound of the hinges drew their attention.

“Harry,” Mrs Weasley spoke, shocked, “you are out of bed. What are you doing here?”

“I’m afraid this isn’t a talk for you, young man,” the Auror told him. He turned to Molly, saying, “Can you please escort him back? I would rather not let a child hear-”

“Yes, of course, sir,” Molly sniffled and gathered herself back. She grabbed him by the shoulders, “Come on, dear-”

“No.”

The two adults stood flabbergasted as Harry moved out of Mrs Weasley’s hold, glaring at the man with furious eyes. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“Harry-”

“I have a  _ right  _ to know,” he reminded her sharply. It would one day fail to function as an excuse, but for now, it made Molly wince as if striked. It made him regretful, but he had to do it. Once this whole mess was sorted, he would apologize.

The Auror had seen their exchange and sighed. “While that’s all good and dandy, I can’t disclose case information to a  _ child.  _ That’s just irresponsible.”

“They’re my parents!” Harry protested, knowing that he had to fight until the man was down to compromise. “I can’t just stand by while they- while they get  _ hanged.” _

Molly drew a sharp breath and the Auror averted his eyes. Harry pedalled maximum speed to  _ ‘Operation: Guilt Tripping’  _ and added on, “Please, I want to know if we can save them! Can’t you do anything?”

“If there was evidence contradicting their crimes, yes, we could postpone the date and arrange for a trial,” the man explained, “but there isn’t. I’m sure if you had some suspicions and some strong backing, you could request for the hanging to be pulled to Yule - but I’m not sure how well that would go. Minister Fudge’s out of his mind.”

“What’s the current date?”

“Samhain.”

_ Fucking Fudge. _

It was the  _ fifth  _ of October. When Harry had created Fudge, he had made him a bit sympathetic, but now all Harry wanted to do was charge at the man and throttle him until his lungs exploded out of him.

He had until the end of October. It wasn’t enough - the way he had written the backstory, he hadn’t given Harry Potter any close family friends he could have gone to. Remus Lupin had been long since deceased, killed by Muggle law enforcement. Sirius Black had been hanged alongside the Potters.

Harry nodded, shoulders slumping. “Thank you, sir.”

“Don’t mention it - um...” The man leaned in and spoke, “I mean it. Don’t mention it, lad. I’ll get a hefty fine otherwise.”

The Auror bid them farewell and left the Manor. Harry let Mrs Weasley navigate the way to his bedroom, not even protesting when she pushed him under the covers.

“Sleep, Harry,” she said, in that motherly way she always had. “Merlin, I can’t believe you just barged in - what would have Auror Moody said if he were there?”

_ Auror Moody would have fucking agreed with me,  _ was Harry’s last thought before he fell into an uneasy dream, filled with cut-off screams and his body disintegrating.

***

Once Harry was fully recovered and ready to go into the Ministry, he asked for Shelly and the butler to accompany him. Though Molly had been wholly disapproving of his resolve, she had let him do as he wished. Harry had thought that it was because he had gotten through to her, but he couldn’t have been more wrong.

Instead, diminutive half-goblin Filius Flitwick had been half of his escort group. This man had been nearly eighty percent of the reason that House Potter had been standing by the time Harry Potter graduated, and he had the duelling skills of an award-winning champion. He probably could have gone into Auror corps - but against all odds, he had chosen to see to Lily and James Potter’s legacy until the end, the almost inescapable Worst Bad Ending. The man had actually been modeled after a high school teacher Harry himself had had, but had perished from a stroke. Instead, Harry had chosen to honor the guy with his own character. 

He didn’t remember actually making him so powerful, but he supposed that the details he hadn’t ironed out was up to the universe to decide.

So, yeah; Harry was glad that Filius Flitwick was accompanying him. The group traveled to the Ministry through a Floo connection - basically, a fireplace you could teleport from - and appeared at the entrance of the Atrium, where countless mages were walking between different departments.

The Atrium was a grandiose, huge place. The walls and the floors were from black marble, and the ceiling was a vivid peacock blue. Various golden symbols littered the walls, probably meaning something to the people who stared at them with frowns and expectant eyes. Parting the crowds of people was a great, sparkling statue of a woman carrying a star above her head, nearly touching the ceiling.

“It’s the statue of the goddess Hecate,” Flitwick informed him, seeing his fascination. “I am told that it isn’t an accurate portrayal, however.”

“Has anyone-?”

“Seen her?” the man finished his sentence. He had a perky, enthusiastic but dignified air about him. Harry was glad to see that he reminded him of his high school teacher, Phinneas Finnick from AP Physics. “I’m afraid  _ no one’s _ seen her! No one  _ alive,  _ that is.”

“Where to, now?” Shelly asked him. Harry blinked and looked at the butler with beseeching eyes.

“To  _ Wizengamot Administration Services,  _ of course!” he announced, starting to walk. Harry and Shelly followed after him.

_ Finally,  _ Harry thought, with some relief.  _ We’re moving toward something. _

With the weight of the letters in his bag comforting him, Harry could finally admit that he was breathing easily for the first time since forever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welp.


	3. Misdirection

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry is in the Ministry now -- but troubles haven't diminished at all...

The Ministry lift was cramped and stifling. The air smelled like body odor and something overwhelmingly artificial, like disinfectant. Harry clamped on his nose with his sleeve, not even bothering to tell the man behind that his elbow was digging into his skull, causing a headache radiating from his forehead.

It came to a stop and the doors opened.  _ “Level Seven: Department of Magical Games and Sports.” _

The Ministry of Magic had nine levels. Harry distantly remembered deciding on the number and just letting it lie, and a part of him dreaded what the universe had come up with. During the early planning stages, he had decided that the Minister’s office would be on Level One, along with all those people who might be working directly under him. There would be… an Undersecretary -- not that Harry knew exactly what a magical Undersecretary would do. There was supposed to be an Advisor -- but he hadn’t outlined more than that, incorrectly assuming that it wouldn’t be relevant to the plot anyway.

Now look where he was: Letting a magical lift carry him from department to department, gambling with his fate. If he could go back in time, he would have slapped his past self. With a wand. And then probably continue slapping him until he gave in and deleted the code altogether.

_ “Level Five: Department of International Magical Cooperation.” _

The man behind him got off and the doors slid behind him, whisking the passengers away into the darkness once again. Vague lights passed above their heads, providing a meager amount of illumination. Harry could barely read the plaque on the wall with heads getting in the way and his height disadvantage. Once or twice, however, he caught words like  _ Wizengamot, Law  _ and  _ Mystery.  _ He supposed that was very telling of what his subconscious was focusing on.

_ “Level Two: Department of Magical Law Enforcement.” _

That was their stop -- Harry grabbed Shelly’s hand and they followed Flitwick into the light, Harry wincing at the sudden brightness. Contrary to the Atrium, Level Two had white marble floors, squeaky clean and glittering with something crystalline mixed into the ground. Harry wondered if this was a prestigious department, and concurred that yes, it was, when several extravagantly clothed wizards passed by.

There were placards on the few doors they encountered. Things like  _ Auror Office, Marital Proceedings  _ and--

_ “Wizengamot Administration Services!”  _ Flitwick exclaimed, showing them to the door. “Here we are. Before you insist on helping, however, please -- let  _ me  _ do the talking.”

“But--”

“You may have found the evidence,” the man cut in, “but you are a child, Young Master. No matter how intelligent, these people won’t listen to you and you must understand that.”

It wasn’t fair.  _ Harry  _ was the only one who knew everything, who even knew the identities of the real culprits. If it wasn’t for him, his parents would be hanged come Samhain. They didn’t know how  _ fragile  _ this attempt was--

He scowled at the floor, signaling to Flitwick that he had given up. They entered the room. Shelly held a protective hand on his shoulder, slowing her steps at the sight.

It was a literal mess. Though  _ Wizengamot Administration Services  _ was a fancy name, there was nothing fancy about the office itself. Many desks were pushed to the corners with one giant table in the middle, storing an ungodly amount of paperwork upon its worn wooden surface. Employees in various states of exhaustion flitted from one corner to the other like a leaf stuck in ventilation, circling its own route in its confusion. Even Flitwick had stopped in his tracks and was staring at the hellish landscape with eyes bathed in awe-mixed horror.

“No Jennifer, I told you that I can’t do dinner for Friday!” a disheveled blond guy screamed. “Dammit, when will you learn?! I work in the Wiz Services, I don’t have time for mealtimes! Date nights! I’M BUSY FILING SEAT HOLDERS’ FUCKING BILL NOTES!!!” The guy hurled the mirror in his hands to the opposite wall and broke down sobbing, sinking into the ground. His coworkers didn’t even look at him, easily stepping over the man’s prone form on the floor.

Flitwick cleared his throat and restarted walking, giving a bemused but concerned glance at the crying man. Shelly followed behind him, and Harry murmured a respectful  _ Rest in pieces  _ as he passed the wizard by.

They wormed their way through the throngs of screeching and depressed workers toward their destination -- a destination only Flitwick knew. Harry wanted to sigh; if he got lost in this office, could he find his way out? Or would he be lost in the filing cabinets for a century? Only the Lord knew. He missed Google Maps a whole lot. Why didn’t he include the Internet in a self-indulgent magical utopia? Not even the Lord knew that one.

“Excuse me,” Flitwick spoke up suddenly, spearing through a wall of people to reach a particular desk. Harry noted with alarm that no one came into the two feet radius of this spot, but he was dragged by Shelly toward their target.

Said target was a drooping woman veiled in faux shadows, document stacks so high that they reached the ceiling surrounding her. At times, a paper plane poked her in the back of her head and she took it without even emoting, only a tired sigh passing through her lips.

“Miss Schatz of Auror Relations?” the butler asked. “I’m here on behalf of House Potter.”

“Sorry, the case is already closed,” Schatz sighed again, haphazardly throwing some paper planes to the air, making them fly on top of their respective stacks. “Do you need to reopen it?”

“Yes. We suspect foul play.”

_ “‘Foul play’  _ he says, like a Quidditch game,” the woman said. “Okay. Here--”

She whistled and called four paper planes from atop the piles, with one additional paper plane snaking out from the middle of a stack tower. Harry watched in wonder at the casual display of magic.

If there was one thing he would never regret, it was the supernatural aspect of this world. He would always love magic -- nothing could ever change that. Not even losing his everything.

“Take these three to the other desk,” she explained, giving the straightened papers to Flitwick. “Fill them and submit them to Faun Siobhan. This one’s for the Auror Office; you’ll need it to request a case reopening. They’ll handle it. And this one--” She took the newly arrived paper and held it open, adjusting her heart shaped glasses. “This is for Azkaban.”

_ “Azkaban?”  _ Harry asked, confused.

Schatz looked over at him. “The prison. Some get put there before a death sentence -- like the Potters.”

_ Like the Potters,  _ echoed around Harry’s head, and he shook his head. “Right.” He had contemplated a prison, but never in detail. He had always thought about a lonely little island in the middle of nowhere, cold and small and isolated, but he had never put a name to it. It had stayed there in the back of his mind, like a childhood nightmare burrowing too deeply for casual access, only to be brought back to the surface in the night, when it's dark.

Now he was paying the price of his rampant imagination. This really sucked.

“As I said, this one’s for Azkaban,” Schatz continued, addressing Flitwick. “The inmates are allowed letters from outside, but with heavy screening. The Aurors will read whatever you write here, so don’t write anything… less than public.”

So  _ ‘don’t write what you wouldn’t tell the Aurors’.  _ Very nice. And if they wanted to be seen as trustworthy by the law enforcement, Harry had to limit how much he said. That meant no obvious codes, no implications, no outright information -- obviously -- and no incriminating (accidentally or otherwise) material.

Well… That greatly limited what he could say to his parents.  _ (He had so many questions; what was different and what wasn’t, did they love him still, were they going to walk to their deaths--)  _ Though he didn’t want to tell them everything, he still wanted to tell them how much they meant to him. The Aurors… They would probably allow that much.

“You will have to inform them about what you’re doing, since they could accidentally work against your efforts. Considering this is a high profile case, there is a large risk of exactly that happening. Good day, you won’t need to ask me about the process further than this. The others will explain.”

They were ushered away into the oncoming traffic of zombie employees, the dark bags under their eyes big enough to have their own presence on the faces. Harry pitied the guys who worked here and wished that he had spared more thought into the Ministry.

Even though Schatz’s explanation had been simple, it proved difficult to actually find the person she mentioned. She had given no descriptions, no navigation tips and no guide to lead them. Only a name. For a time that felt close to an hour, they wandered around while trying to find someone to take them to their destination.

“You can sit there,” a stray, fresh-looking intern told them, pointing at a mahogany bench at the distant wall. “Wizengamot Services has a few greeters just for visitors. They must be on their breaks -- it’s rare when they all take it together, but it happens.”

Reluctantly, the trio sat down on the bench and tried to pass the time. Flitwick went through some of the documents Schatz had given them and filled out a few spaces. There were some he left out, which Harry suspected was because they weren't clear or required outside information. Harry asked him if he could see the papers and Flitwick handed two Wizengamot related ones over.

As Harry skimmed them, however, he was faced with questions and information he sorely lacked. For one, he didn't know what a Wand ID was exactly -- or a  _ Magical Address _ or  _ Owl Ability.  _ It thoroughly confused him until Shelly proposed a crash course in legalities and he agreed, way too eager to understand these vague terms.

"The Wand ID is a description of your wand, which is unique to you," she explained. "You get your wand once you're seventeen and graduate from an institute. The Ministry commissions a wandmaker once you submit your OWLs and NEWTs -- that is, the major exams -- and you are queued for a custom made wand. It can take months before you get it, but once you do, it's considered your identification. Muggles don't have them, but they have Identification Cards instead.

"A Magical Address is the address of your home base," Shelly continued. "It's usually where you live for an extended amount of time. Your magic considers this place your home and will bring letters addressed to your name to this residence. There are custom addresses you can key to specific places, however. For example, a letter to Mushel Riviera would arrive at their home. If someone wrote  _ Where Mushel Riviera Stands  _ instead, it would go there, but it would be quite hard on the owl if you move around too much."

"Aren't the possibilities limitless? You can word things in a lot of ways."

"Yes, the Department of Mysteries actually researches this. They deal with -- very literally --  _ mysteries,  _ so anything that seems inconceivable, you will find there."

"Did you ever go there?" Harry asked, curious. 

Shelly's eyes crinkled around the edges, lips pressing together. "I've been there. It's an…  _ interesting _ place."

"It does sound like it," Harry said genuinely. "And what does Owl Ability mean?"

"Two things simultaneously: The time of day when you are most available for an owl post, and your personal owl's magical awareness level. Certain owl breeds and some exceptional birds can get past specific wards by using a recessive innate ability, which makes correspondence both faster and more invasive."

"Invasive, how?"

"Imagine if you told the owl to deliver the letter to someone," she said as an example, "and the owl went past their protection wards on their property and delivered the letter in person without using a specialized address. Some truly talented owls can even bypass the wards on Azkaban -- or Wizengamot members' houses."

Harry understood then. "Ah."

"Yeah, it's great," Shelly said unexpectedly, making him snort. "You can prank _ many  _ people with owls like those. Maggie let me pull one on her grandmother once -- it was a wonderful experience, and I think it brought us even closer during our early friendship stage."

"Sounds cool," he remarked, suddenly noting the time. "Um, Flitwick--"

"Yes?" the man's head snapped up, alert as a dragonfly. "It's been an hour and…  _ seven _ minutes, I believe. The greeters sure are taking long with their break."

"Honestly, I can't blame them," Harry spoke. "It feels like the Ministry likes to overwork the employees here. Do they get compensation for the extra hours?"

"Oh, they sure do -- the Wizengamot changes the budget for overtime work almost yearly, those greedy little faux goblins. They  _ do _ try to limit it more than they should --  _ but!"  _ he exclaimed, "they can't! They tried, but there was a strike -- it made the headlines, back in my day--"

"That was only 1982, sir."

"Right you are, young one," Flitwick tittered. "You were a little girl then, no? I still remember your first swear words,  _ tumbling _ out your mouth like a  _ Hitmage,  _ of all things! And those people curse  _ very well." _

Harry let them chatter amongst themselves and glanced around for a clock, but there wasn't anything resembling it. It lit a tiny flame of panic in his chest, feeling time leaking away.

_ There are probably office hours,  _ he thought.  _ If we miss it, we will probably have wasted half a day here. Then we will have to come back again another day, and then if we miss it again, it might be too late-- _

"I'm gonna go and look around," Harry announced, already standing up. Shelly stood with him, but Flitwick stayed sitting.

"I'll be here, if you'll forgive my impudence," he said, straightening out the documents in his hands. "And perhaps," he continued, lowering his voice a bit, a serious glint appearing in his eyes, "by separating, we might find out more."

"Yes, sir," Shelly replied, inexplicably understanding that cryptic message. She held Harry by his elbow and steered him to the general direction of the employees.

_ There is something going on,  _ Harry realized abruptly, mentally slapping his forehead. "Shelly, what was that?"

She looked at him, then very deliberately, looked around. "Nothing you need to concern yourself with, Young Master."

_ Are we…  _ Harry didn't want to contemplate it, but the chance was too great.  _ Are we being watched? _

Honestly, the prospect was more than frightening, considering what Harry knew. The Gaunts -- inbred and dim as they may be --  _ did  _ possess the traits of self-preservation and paranoia. Before their exposé in 1990, they had had covert agents in the Ministry, doing espionage and other personalized crimes for them. And knowing what he did, it was very likely that they had insiders in Wizengamot Administration Services. Sometimes, Harry hated being right.

The two tread through the throngs of employees, taut like violin wires and even more conscious of the crowd slipping around them. Before, Harry hadn’t realized that literally  _ anyone  _ could camouflage themselves in this gathering, without even being noticed by the regular employees. It was probably one of the downsides of burdening one department too much.

They came across a line of desks, with people in lines. Harry scrutinized each of them and realized with dismay that they were all too long to wait for.

“Excuse me,” he recklessly asked someone nearby, who startled and stared. “Do you know where Faun Siobhan is? We were directed to them from Schatz.”

“Ah, her? I don’t know, I’ve been here for only a few days,” the person -- an intern, Harry noticed -- answered nervously. “You could ask the errand people; they visit the deskers the most -- um, the ones who work at desks, I mean -- they can probably give you some directions. Weren’t there any greeters to tell you?”

“No,” Harry said, sighing in relief. “Thank you!”

“No trouble, good luck.”

Harry and Shelly wandered around some more, trying to spot someone doing an errand -- they were like vicious sharks, scenting blood in the water. They shoved some innocents in the way of their target more than once, and it sort of made Harry’s spiteful side happier, knowing that they were making someone’s life more uncomfortable -- just like his was right now.

Harry found someone with a basket of Snitches -- round, golden little balls fitting inside a palm; they were usually used in Quidditch -- who had just entered the department through a different entrance than the one they had used, and cornered him against the wall.

“Hi,” he greeted, grinning too stiffly and sharply. “We’re looking for a Faun Siobhan. That is S-I-O-B-H-A-N. Do you know her?”

“K-Know her?” he repeated, stammering. “I suppose I do? I mean, we don’t really  _ talk  _ to each other here--”

“We were wondering where she was,” he interjected without a care. “We were told that you could help us.”

“You were  _ told?”  _ the man repeated again, sounding even more timid. “Ah, I had some errands…”

“A delivery of  _ Snitches?”  _ Shelly started this time, giving the man a vindictively haughty gaze up and down. “I see. That looks very…  _ urgent.  _ Some emergency that must be.”

“The Department of Magical Games and Sports isn’t on this level,” Harry added, smiling sweetly. Once this whole incident was over, he was going to make Shelly his double-teaming buddy. They were  _ invincible  _ together. “Are you lost? Maybe you should stick to working in your own department, instead of cross-department errands.”

The man’s eyes darted between them, looking for an escape route, but he seemed to have found none and sighed. They had won. They had proved their dominance over the random worker. Harry patted himself in the back for a job well done.

“Alright,” the man said, “I’ll show you to her. But I  _ have  _ to go back to the errand.”

“Of course,” Shelly replied while Harry snickered under his breath and muttered,  _ Errand boy.  _ They were led through a winding route that not even the most adept of pathfinders could memorize, and then showed a tiny cubicle at a corridor corner.

“This is her office,” the man explained, gesturing to the tiny thing. It was a head higher than him, and only reached Shelly’s forehead. “You have to knock before entering, but feel free otherwise.”

“Thank you,” Harry offered graciously. When the man left, they went ahead and opened the door to the cubicle.

Inside was a wide and spacious office, decorated in blues and greens. It was a far cry from the bustling and purple Wizengamot Services department, and Harry found himself immediately feeling more at ease.

At the only desk inside was a young woman with sandy hair, a pair of round glasses on the bridge of her nose and a seashell necklace on her collarbone. She startled when she saw them arrive and quickly tidied up the desk. “Ah -- sorry about that -- I wasn’t expecting visitors to come.”

“That’s alright,” Harry said, nodding awkwardly. “Hello, we were directed here by Schatz. Auror Relations, I think?”

“Ah,” Siobhan intoned somewhat strangely. “Schatz. I see -- have a seat, I’ll see to your papers in a minute--”

She went around and called some documents with a few fancy hand movements, looking oddly graceful as she did so. Harry  _ loved  _ that there were so many different ways to perform the same magic.

Shelly looked around in curiosity and set her intense scrutiny on the unsuspecting woman. Harry knew how heavy it could be, so he felt a little pity for her.

“She must have given you some papers, do you have them?”

“We do,” Harry said, taking out the copies Flitwick had given him. He wondered if the man was headed to the Auror Office right now. “Here.”

Siobhan took the papers with gentle hands and looked them over, nodding every so often and sometimes frowning. Finally, she took a pen with its cap on and leaned over, getting into his space.

“See here?” she spoke, pointing at an empty bracket. “You need to fill this in.”

Harry blinked. “Um, I don’t know how--”

“Ah -- I see, sorry. You can actually ask for your Audience Number from the next office; here, let me draw you a map.”

She transfigured a ruled notebook page into an empty A4 paper, and drew a general map over it. “This will lead you to one of my coworkers, Roger Dullahan. He’ll give you your number and redirect you from there. I’m sorry I can’t help more, but if it’s any consolation, your papers look fine. Roger might be able to help more, since he’s been here longer than I.”

“It’s no trouble,” Harry told her. “Thank you, good day!”

They exited and followed the map, going through some reverse traffic to reach Dullahan’s office. Once they found the distinguishable cubicle, they knocked and entered.

Inside was a completely different vibe from Siobhan’s office. Instead of the soothing, polite tinges of the sea, the walls were glittering with a shocking cadmium red, with the ceiling high and black. Orange-glowing sconces rested on the walls, illuminating the office in a heady light.

“Visitors,” the man at the couch grumbled. There was no desk -- in fact, there was only four furniture inside the room: The couch Dullahan was sitting on, a coffee table with paperwork heaped onto it, a couch opposing him and a filing cabinet sitting at the corner, which seemed to be mandatory for all desk employees.

“Hello,” Harry spoke, meeker this time, in the face of an unknown. “We were sent by Siobhan? Faun Siobhan?”

“Of course you were. She won’t send anything else anymore,” he muttered, rising from the cushions and doing a mild stretch. He was mildly handsome, with a well-groomed beard and well styled hair. His eyes were weirdly shaped, but that didn’t deduct from his looks at all. Paired with the…  _ intriguing  _ decor, he might be considered a charming fellow.

“We have papers and some questions,” Shelly took over for him. Dullahan nodden and waved them over, settling on the previous couch to look over the papers.

“Yeah, you do need an Audience Number for the case reopening,” Dullahan said once they told him what Siobhan did. “Additionally, you also need the Wizengamot members’ permission for it, since they’ll be doing the execution. Once these are done with, you also need to go and give them over to the Auror Office. Here, I’ll give you a number for the queue--”

Dullahan took out a gadget and pressed his finger on top of it, settling back into the coffee table’s drawer. “Thirty-four. There, right it in the bracket. And then we need to fill in the rest of these--”

It took close to half an hour to finish with all the papers. Once they were done, Dullahan waved them goodbye and closed the door on their backs when they left.

“Okay, to the Auror Office now?” Harry asked, but Shelly put her hand on his hands, gently taking the papers away. “Shelly?”

“Don’t worry, Young Master,” she said, giving a mild smile. It was the most emotive thing Harry had seen from her all day, and it comforted an insecure part of him somehow. “We will get through this.”

“I hope so.”

They walked in the direction of the exit. The employee traffic was less crowded than the time they had arrived, so it made for an easier travel. Harry felt some relief at the ease at which he could walk without stepping on someone's toes or bumping into them.

Once at the door, however, Shelly turned right around and stalked toward another direction.

_ What?  _ Harry asked inwardly, befuddled, but after a glance at the innocuous door, followed her.  _ Did she pick the wrong exit? _

Shelly led them through the busy corridors to a lone desk by the wall, shocking the woman at the desk with a harsh slap of the papers on the table.

“We’ve been told to bring these to the Auror Office,” she explained without explaining, confusing Harry further.  _ Did she forget that we are in Wizengamot Services? _

“Alright?” the woman replied, seemingly even more bemused than Harry. “Did you need them delivered? I can call an errand runner--”

“We don’t need anything of the sort,” his maid refused, “we need to check whether they’ve been filled out correctly.”

“Ah, of course. Let me see--”

The result wasn’t what Harry had been expecting, however.

“There are several brackets filled incorrectly,” the woman -- a greeter, Harry realized then, seeing the card pinned to her shirt -- told them. “You need to first have the case reopened with  _ this  _ document,  _ then  _ you will receive an audience with the Wizengamot. You can’t get an Audience Number out of the blue, unfortunately. And then there is the fact that you can’t deliver these without the person with the Wand ID belongs to by your side. And…” She checked the third document again. “Yes, the department number is faulty too. That corresponds to the Department of Magical Games and Sports.”

Fucking  _ Magical Games and Sports. _

“Can we refill them?” Shelly asked.

The greeter shook her head. “Unfortunately; Schatz, the one who distributes these papers, is out. You can siphon the ink and rewrite it, but it would take too long. The receiving office will be closed by then. May I suggest coming in tomorrow?”

_ We’ve been played. _

Harry silently sank down to a crouch in front of the desk, eyes unseeing and cold all over. He had been fooled -- they knew. They  _ knew  _ that he was trying to save them, and they had stopped him, right in the Ministry without him even realizing.

The Gaunts knew what he was doing. They were working against it.

Harry wheezed without breath, suddenly remembering to breathe, his throat feeling raw. He took air in gulps and tried to think critically, to -- be  _ rational.  _ He had to think with logic. He couldn’t get caught up by emotions,  _ not now-- _

“Harry,” Shelly spoke by his side, crouching alongside him. Her voice was soft. “We will not surrender. The Potters will live.”

_ I have to believe that,  _ Harry thought, trying to force it on his brain.  _ They won’t die, they can’t die -- not when I’m here and I know everything. _

Yet he still kept shivering, feeling so small and helpless. Why couldn’t he believe that? Somehow, everything seemed to be working against him.

“If all hope is lost, we will look through other means,” Shelly said, the sound low. Harry knew that she was talking about less than legal ways, and recalled that he was in the Ministry. Good Shelly -- she needed a raise for her subtlety.

He slowly started to get back into a regular breathing pattern, feeling his mind coming back to him. He had completely lost control -- he couldn’t let that happen, not when they were in a place where they were surrounded by enemies.

“Better now?” Shelly asked, looking uncomfortable and stony. Harry nodded, realizing that she didn’t know how to reassure him. Frankly, she didn’t need to -- he needed calm and reason more than empty platitudes like  _ It will be okay. _

Had Maggie been here, she probably would have known what to do. She would have been warm and personable and charmed the errand runners into giving out Siobhan’s location, with much less effort than what Harry and Shelly had mustered.

“Thank you, Miss,” Shelly addressed the greeter, receiving a respectful nod in return. They regrouped at the benches, thankfully able to find them in the first place.

“I can’t believe we were duped,” Harry muttered as he slumped back, watching the flow of workers trickle down. “And we were so close too. Schatz gave us everything we needed, but then  _ Dullahan  _ tricked us, that bastard.”

“I wonder how they managed to hide a conspiracy in the department,” Shelly mused, eyes focused. With that remark, Harry found his focus sharpening too.

That was right. They knew the man’s name. If they reported him for misconduct, they could get him fired. _ There must be something else…  _

“We need to find Flitwick,” Harry started, thinking it through. “He’s alone. He might still be trying to find Siobhan.”

Shelly nodded, taking out a --  _ medallion  _ from beneath her jacket, pressing the center. It began to glow, and soon after, Flitwick could be seen in the crowd, approaching the benches.

“Hello, children,” he greeted, looking perkier. They quietly echoed their hellos and sat together in silence. Harry felt an odd reverence for the moment, three people sitting together in soundless contemplation for a common goal. 

“How did your search go?” Flitwick asked. Harry shook his head and recounted the whole incident.

“Turns out Dullahan was a fucking bitch, and he totally sabotaged us--”

_ “Young Master,”  _ Flitwick cut in,  _ “language,  _ please.”

“Um, yes, sorry -- he was… a  _ darn  _ douchebag--”

“Douchebag is a profanity,” Shelly interjected.

“It _ is?  _ What the fuck.”

_ “Young Master.” _

In the end, they settled for  _ jerk --  _ which was as non-profane as Harry could get with insults, so it was all good. “He was a monumental jerk, the jerkiest of all jerks. I wish I could curse him out, but here we are. Anyway, it should be easy enough to find him again -- Siobhan drew us a map after all--”

When he took out the map, however, the drawing had vanished, showing only the original off-white color. “What the  _ fuck.” _

“Let me see,” Shelly commanded, taking it from his hands. She ended up staring at the empty expanse of paper without any expressions. “That  _ bitch.” _

“Miss  _ Riviera! Language!”  _ Flitwick warned, but as soon as he took a look at the papers, his bushy eyebrows drew high and he let out a string of foreign words, none of them sounding complimentary.  _ “Siobhan  _ gave you the map?”

_ Siobhan.  _ Fucking  _ Siobhan  _ too? How many times would Harry get bamboozled before the universe fucking stopped?

“Jesus,” Harry snarled, standing up. His eyes darted around for something to take his anger out on, chest burning hot with a rage he’d never experienced before. “Dammit, dammit,  _ fuck  _ this, _ fuck  _ that and  _ fuck Siobhan--” _ He swiveled around and kicked the bench itself. Pain exploded in his toe and he shouted, taking his foot in hand and hopping around like a deranged rabbit. “Ah fuck, FUCK! AW!”

“If you’re done with your tantrum, Young Master,” Flitwick trained an unimpressed look on him, obviously not about to entertain his childish impulses. “There is work to be done and things to talk about!”

“How did it go for you?” Shelly asked him.

The man boomed with a brief, sardonic laughter. “I was turned away at the Auror Office’s door!”

_ “What?”  _ Harry exclaimed in spite of the agony in his toe, stumbling back onto the bench. “How could they  _ do  _ that?!”

Flitwick shook his head. “Whoever is behind this, they have too much influence for us to contend with. We must retreat and come back another day!”

“We can’t!” Harry refused. “We haven’t made progress at all! What if they learn what we’re trying to do, and move the date earlier? What if my parents die  _ tomorrow?  _ There is no telling what could happen, and I won’t take a step back until I’m  _ sure  _ that they aren’t in danger.”

“Be that as it may, you are a child yet -- I may be a talented butler, but I do not have the power necessary to win against these people. Dear Mushel -- though she is a marvel at duelling and such skills -- is a mere maid! The truth is, Young Master, we can’t win, not  _ right now.  _ This is not the time to persist, for  _ failure  _ lies at the end of that path.”

Harry wanted to spit in the face of that statement and tear apart the whole department, but that wouldn’t help, would it? He was filled to the brim with the need to  _ act  _ without the actual ability to do it, and it  _ rankled.  _ Things should be faster -- his parents should have been freed the  _ second  _ he had come in here, but that wasn’t how the world worked. No; instead, there was bureaucracy and meaningless documents and proper procedure that was  _ so fucking useful, well done, Ministry! _

Honestly -- why couldn’t he just blame the Gaunts and be done with it? They couldn’t take him out--

_ But they could,  _ Harry realized, the truth chilling him from bone to marrow.  _ They could silence me. Who even am I, in this world? I’m nobody. Everyone would say, ‘How sad,’ and move on. House Potter would dissolve and nothing would remain. And there would be nothing I could do against that. _

_ They have all the cards here. I can’t win. _

“Okay,” he spoke, quiet and tired. The day had been long, and he wished for his soft, cloudy bed. A night’s worth of sleep would be wonderful right now, along with some food in his stomach. Removed from the hyperfocus of his goal, Harry was suddenly aware of how much his body was protesting this harsh treatment. “Just… Let’s just go home.”

Shelly smiled at him, and together, they left Wizengamot Administration Services.

***

The next day, they had gone back to the Wizengamot Services to inquire about Roger Dullahan and Faun Siobhan.

“Siobhan is a new hire,” the greeter said with a frown. “She’s only been in for a year, but I think she inherited a cubicle from a mentor here. And sorry to say this, but I’ve never heard about a Dullahan in the office. Wish I could tell you more, but I’m as clueless as you are. I’d tell you to ask Schatz but… you know how busy she is, don’t you? She’s manning the entire bureaucratic hell of the office right now, especially after the mess that was the last Fairy Boundaries Proposal. And no one else really knows the entirety of the deskers or cubicles.”

“Thank you anyway,” Flitwick said, letting the man leave to attend to other guests. “What do you think?”

“Dullahan is a fucking bitch, and Siobhan is his accomplice,” Harry immediately went off. “They must the -- err, the agents of the ones who ambushed Sirius. The snakes on drugs or the mystery guys.”

“Siobhan is the main guy in the scheme,” Shelly proposed, “she receives the documents from Schatz and sends the people of interest to Dullahan -- which might be an alias. It’s possible that he changes names after every scheme. The ones who  _ do  _ know where Siobhan’s cubicle is, were probably bribed to forget about it or got Obliviated by a hired underground expert. The route is also hard to memorize, so no one can casually stroll into the office without a senior employee helping. Schatz is too busy to see the same person more than once, with her workload and so many people needing her. Essentially, they have cornered us. We can’t bother Schatz again, but we also can’t find Siobhan or Dullahan and demand justice. The errand runner we found last time will probably get Obliviated too.”

“Are you saying that this is a long term  _ organized crime  _ thing?” Harry asked, incredulous. It sounded crazy, but the Gaunts were crazy anyway. They certainly had the means to achieve it. “Because if you are, that means our job just became a  _ hella  _ more difficult.”

“Or does it,” Flitwick wondered, stroking his triangle beard. “Hmm… How tiresome. We will regroup another day, children. Back to the Manor!”

***

Harry couldn’t stop thinking about it. It was midnight, and he was having a hard time sleeping.

They had the evidence. They wanted to reopen the case and postpone the hanging. The whole situation was iffy as fuck in the first place -- James and Lily Potter, secretly Dark Mages committing murder, human trafficking and general crime? It was ridiculous. If anything,  _ foul play _ should have been suspected immediately.

But there was nothing fair about the Ministry. People like the Gaunts could control it from the shadows and no one could do anything about it. People like Siobhan could mislead innocents and no one could do anything about it. Fucking  _ Dullahan  _ could hide in the bosom of Wizengamot Services and  _ no one could do anything about it. _

_ It's so unfair,  _ he thought again, his mind circling the sentence like a shark, hellbent on its prey. When it drifted, that thought came back to haunt him, unwilling to leave for good.

And it shouldn't. Harry  _ should  _ be thinking about it. This was crucial -- this was his  _ parents'  _ fate he was holding in his hands. If it went wrong, they would be the ones paying the price.

_ Think. There must be something I can do. Something I haven't thought about, something unexpected that hasn't occurred to me yet… _

He could… get an insider? So he could spy on the Gaunts back?

The thought made him snort because it reminded him of drama movies, those with long ass plots that made him snort every time a plot twist happened. Something like that could never be a feasible course of action.

He rolled to his side and tucked himself deeper into his blankets, ready for another restless night…

... _ But what if it is? _

_ Oh my God,  _ Harry's thoughts raced all of a sudden, a new plethora of plans blossoming in mere seconds.  _ Jesus -- this could work. I could sneak a spy into the Gaunts' network. It's risky, but I could. Hell, I could find someone to defect on the bastards -- but who-- _

Someone who didn't have anything to lose, someone who had the right reasons, someone too important to kill outright, someone close to them but  _ not  _ close enough to be suspected--

**_Guess_ ** _ who,  _ Harry thought back to his inner voice, exultant and breathless with adrenaline. 

  
  


_ Tom fucking Riddle. _


	4. Escalation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Gaunts play their hand too early. Shelly and Maggie reveal secrets without speaking at all--- honestly, these two girls do not seem to be characters he'd come up with. Harry might develop PTSD at this rate.

OCTOBER 5TH, 1990

Skimming the audit Flitwick handed over, Harry was certain that someone was gonna get their head unattached from their body, and it wouldn’t be Griphook.

“Are you telling me,” he started, watching the teller tremble behind their accounts manager, “that someone has been so obviously stealing from the Potters and _none of you_ decided to alert us?”

“Vaults are not audited unless requested,” Griphook spoke with his nasally voice, and if Harry had had any hope for him, it would have fled now. “We can compensate you for the…trouble, and investigate the theft, but we will not accept any insults to our system, as it was established in accordance to _your_ laws in the first place.”

Wow, goblins really didn’t pull back their punches. “I didn’t mean any offence, I apologize. Could the investigation be hurried? We are…” Harry trailed off as he noticed the warning look in Flitwick’s eyes, and remembered that goblins were greedy, if not the _greediest._ “We would like to apprehend these criminals swiftly, for the insult to our House.”

He hoped that he had managed it, and a quick glance in the butler’s direction assured him that he had, at least passably. It wouldn’t do to give the goblins _more_ advantage against them.

Griphook snorted and motioned another teller closer, dismissing the first one who had to be excused to go clean up after the scare. “I suggest you do not push these ones too hard—they are fragile. We cannot keep replacing them constantly, and there are already too many of your kind for us to deal with.”

Harry hadn’t written Griphook into the story, but for all his general racial snobbery (honestly, justified), he was so savage that Harry was tempted to prostrate himself before the goblin. “We’ll try to take care.”

“See to it that you do.”

From there on, it was smooth-sailing. Griphook gave them a complete account of their heirlooms, which rested in a deeper and more secure vault, and then a total of their coins. Harry’s eyes popped out of their sockets in shock at the amount— _a galleon was equal to five pounds!! Who has so much money?! Who NEEDS so much money?!!_ —but Flitwick was completely unruffled. Dare he say, he was almost _frowning._ And he had thought that the amount stolen from the auxiliary vaults had been substantial! As if he wasn’t still filthy rich, rich enough to swim in gold like Smaug from the Hobbit!

“I am concerned about the security, if thieves are among us,” Flitwick started frankly, and thus began an incredible negotiation over vault relocation and additional guards. Harry had known that Flitwick was half-goblin—it had been in his file back at the Manor—but he hadn’t known that he had such an iron grip on his heritage, what with the tense relations between mages and goblins. Griphook looked sour enough to have swallowed a lemon, sure—but he wasn’t throwing daggers from his eyes like he had when he eyed Harry, even though he was barely grown. The goblin was _almost_ polite, and he was entertaining Flitwick’s arguments and points.

“Gringotts has never been robbed,” the new teller insisted for the nth time. “Anyone can swear it! We are honorable, unlike mages!”

“Forgive his lack of diplomacy,” Griphook told Flitwick, conveniently ignoring Harry who was actually the old man’s superior. If it put the grumpy goblin in a good mood to stomp on Harry’s authority, then he would gladly step aside. They needed every amenity they could get. “It is true that Gringotts has never been _robbed,_ but it is also true that oversights exist. Our tellers are not yet mature enough to distinguish between facts and legends.”

The teller flushed a ruddy color and Griphook continued, “If it would… _please_ our clients, we are willing to provide extra measures during the investigation.”

“For a price, I assume,” Harry chimed in, skeptical that goblins would act on benevolence alone.

Griphook indicated with his head, looking amiable for the first time. “Not as _fresh_ as you seem, are you? Yes—acts not dictated that we must perform, require an offering. Are you willing to do what you must to see this through?”

It was _exactly_ the sort of shifty talk that was characteristic of duplicitous entities. Harry had thought long and hard on that point while designing some scenes, particularly the one with the kidnapping plot in Luna Lovegood’s route.

Right now, however, it wasn’t helping him a lot. Harry sent a beseeching look at Flitwick. The butler, seeing that his charge was in a difficult spot, took over the conversation and haggled to an affordable (yet still disgustingly high, what the fuck) price, citing many instances of discounts and some obscure references to magical law, then smoothing the tension with a few gifts from the artifact vault. Harry was righteously outraged that Flitwick would just _give away_ those artifacts (which Harry had only come to know about a few seconds ago) but if it saved his parents in the long run, he wouldn’t even hesitate to sell their family manor, let alone give up a few measly magical trinkets.

Taking the bait, Griphook graciously accepted their gifts and sent word for an investigation to start, high priority. “We will see to it that the thieves are found within the time limit, given that Lord and Lady Potter are incarcerated with a possible death sentence,” he said, startling Harry who had never mentioned his parents. “Humph. We goblins are aware of the political situation. Nonetheless, it is…” The goblin smirked, showing off a long, sharp incisor. _“Entertaining,_ to scare wizards into behavior.”

Griphook was an _asshole._

The duo left the vault with mixed feelings and vague satisfaction, considering their current problems. This put a bit of a dent in Harry’s plans to break his parents out of prison—by Flitwick’s expression, he could parse that assassins and mercenaries were a lot more expensive than they could afford safely. What now?

“We must return to the Manor and speak with Mushel,” Flitwick said with a determined tone, his bushy eyebrows undulating like caterpillars as he frowned.

Harry nodded before blinking, realizing that he didn’t understand. “Mushel?”

Flitwick stared at him. “Yes. Mushel. Mushel Riviera. I presumed that dear Shelly had introduced herself—did she not?”

Shelly’s name was _Mushel?_ Who the hell named her?

The name rang some bells in his mind, and it was only after a few seconds of dumb contemplation that he remembered that she had actually mentioned it back at the Ministry, so off-handedly and casually that Harry hadn’t noticed it was a clue. Huh. Did that mean that Maggie’s name wasn’t actually Maggie? Was it short for Margaret like a normal person, or short for Maggot, considering that mages seemed prone to brain-rot when it came to naming their children? He would have to ask politely the next time he talked with her.

Meanwhile, as they used Flitwick’s personal Portkey to teleport home, Harry reconsidered the beauty of the magical world now that nauseating travel options were, like, _a thing._ From Shelly’s accounts, Apparation was nauseating, Portkeys were nauseating, _Floo travel_ was nauseating—what the heck _wasn’t_ nauseating?! Why would his own story do this to him!

Wordlessly, Flitwick handed a vial of soft pink liquid to him—oh. Potion. _Right,_ Harry thought, _who cares about nausea when you have instant nausea cure?_

“It’s not instant,” Flitwick said. Harry had a mere moment to lose his _shit_ and think that the butler was reading his mind, but the man continued, “Magical travel is always unpleasant for children, I’m afraid. The usual cures for nausea only work to a degree, since the issue isn’t actually physical but magical.”

“...Can’t someone nullify the magical cause then?”

“It’s not quite so simple, Young Master,” Flitwick spoke, but didn’t explain further. Harry was quickly coming to learn that the old man only lectured what was requested, and not anything more. It was an annoying trait, but it wasn’t like it was his duty to teach Harry, who should have come up with a detailed magical system instead of a ready-made, barely developed one. Since the details he hadn’t outlined had been auto-generated by the universe, he was extremely unsure as to which of his assumptions were true and which were… _awfully_ not true.

Two maids welcomed them at the gates, wearing the more comfortable black working uniform rather than the formal one used for entertaining guests, their hair tied in tight up-dos. One took Harry’s thick cloak and did the regular charm refreshments on it—clothes had to be primed for maximum comfort; temperature charms according to weather, anti-chafe charms according to fabrics and skin types, spells to maintain the durability of embroidery, resizing charms to adjust the length and tightness on a whim and so, _so_ much more.

Harry had come to learn that for all he had created this world, he actually knew next to nothing about it, compared to the sheer _culture_ he had been saddled with. It was probably lucky that he had transmigrated to this universe early on as a child, otherwise everyone would have known that he was not Harry Potter. And promptly performed the wizarding equivalent of an exorcism.

He shivered in his place as his thoughts ran amok, letting the stoic-faced maid take off the outer layers of his outfit, leaving only the jacket and his daily garments. He shook his arms to let the sleeves sit right, then rushed down the corridor without acknowledging the two maids bowing to him.

If he doesn’t see it, it doesn’t exist. So far, it has saved him from unnecessary discomfort.

“Shelly? Are you there!” Harry yelled as he cracked open the door to the garden, expecting to see the dark-haired girl sitting melodramatically among the flowers. She wasn’t in her usual spot—that is, she wasn’t disassociating in the meadow—but that only strengthened his resolve. Shelly— _Mushel,_ damn it, he still couldn’t believe that was her name—enjoyed(?) standing in quiet places and being idle for hours, which Harry had only realized after tailing her the whole day after the Ministry fiasco. He had only seen her diligent and comforting side, so he couldn’t have guessed that the serious, scarily competent maid would have been one to laze about watching bugs and daisies. But, well, to each to their own, he guessed. Harry had no right to judge, especially since his hobby was doodling memes on the margins of academic books.

In the end, he found her doing chores—doing the laundry, to be precise. It was the first time he had seen her on her shift, so he was taken aback. Shelly’s hands worked fast like a spider’s needles weaving silky web, hanging it off branches and letting the white threads dangle for prey. From what Harry understood, servants’ children often got caught in the tangle of laundry, so the analogy was pretty accurate.

“Young Master,” she greeted, noticing him without turning her head. “Was your visit to Gringotts fruitful?”

“I guess you could say that,” he said, deliberating his words. “Shelly, I don’t think we can hire an assassin anymore.”

Her shoulders jolted and she froze, tilting her head down. “I see.” 

Harry frowned in concern.

“Are you okay?” He wondered whether he should hold her hand or something. People liked it when a cute kid held their hand, didn’t they? Was that only applicable to babies?

Then she turned her head in his direction, and he noticed the trembling, upward tick of her mouth, and realized that _oh, she was laughing. At HIM._

“You can laugh out loud,” Harry said as he pouted, huffing when it only broke her poker face to feeble pieces. “I’m not gonna, like, get offended. I’m mature enough.”

Shelly exhaled through her nose, very quickly. Was that a laugh? Was that _Shelly’s_ equivalent of a laugh? If so, he felt very accomplished. She had a perpetually apathetic face (a part of him yearned to call it _resting bitch face)_ no matter how pretty it was.

“I won’t insult you like that,” Shelly said, piecing her mask back together. As soon as she looked composed enough, she threw the last of the sheets on the thin wire and shrunk the empty basket, tucking it in her pocket. “All right. Let’s go back inside. I assume the meeting with your accounts manager wasn’t spectacular?”

“There is _not spectacular,_ and then there is _absolutely horrible,”_ Harry retorted drily. By instinct, he took a hold of her hand and both of them froze.

“Um,” he intoned, wide eyes staring at their interlocked fingers. He hadn’t actually meant to do that, but something in him had just— jumped out, eager and happy, and acted on reflex. Had Harry Potter—the original, the one who was an actual kid, the one whom he had stolen his life from—been a tactile kid? Had he initiated contact with friends and family often? Harry had designed him to be a somewhat naive, needy and cheerful child. Like—Like a sheep! Sheep were cute! That didn’t mean _he_ wanted to be cute! Did Shelly even enjoy physical affection? What if he sort of broke some personal boundary—?

Then, unexpectedly, her hand tightened around his.

“It’s lonely, isn’t it?” she asked, eyes boring into his, a shrewd glimmer in them. Harry blinked and nodded dumbly, confused by her demeanor. “It’s okay. No matter what happens, even when everyone around you is gone, you will at least have yourself.”

That… didn’t really reassure him, but it was somewhat comforting. He blinked some more in childish innocence (feigned) and answered, “I’ll also have you and Maggie, right? And Flitwick. He’s really, _really_ good at his job. I can't imagine firing him.”

Shelly continued looking at him with a perturbing gaze. Once Harry finally had enough and started shifting, she sighed and hardened her grip, bringing him into the Manor.

“I suggest you hasten your plans,” she said once they were back inside, thoroughly confusing Harry. “Something tells me to expect retaliation, very soon. We cannot afford to idle.”

Um, _what?_ What made Shelly think that Harry had a plan? Didn’t she see that he was (physically and emotionally) a ten-year-old kid?

Maybe, just maybe, Harry Potter was a child genius? Did he win some magic contest as a toddler or something? Suffice to say, Harry wasn’t exactly sure what she was alluding to, but it sounded ominous enough to take note. “Okay?”

Shelly— _Mushel!!!_ —huffed another breath-laugh and escorted him to his room, where he would do his thing while waiting for lunch. Harry heaved a relieved sigh when she closed the door after her, and flopped on the bed.

_So. I got rid of one of the reasons the Potters were sentenced to die._

Frankly, it was the height of folly that Harry had thought to find some useless excuses to kill the Potters off in the game. Why had he done that? Couldn’t he have just been a bad writer and let the plot holes be? The plot holes left breathing rooms for character arcs!

In Harry Potter’s backstory, the Potters had been accused of: Firstly, practicing illegal, very much sadistic magic. Secondly, human trafficking and colluding with some shady groups in the underworld. Thirdly, embezzling(?) from their ancestors’ vault for selfish purposes(?). It was the third reason which had always been vague and unimportant to Harry, so he hadn’t thought to flesh it out properly. Look at him now! Scrambling for a solution!! If he hadn’t been such a stickler for number symbolism he could have had a nice, comfortable conspiracy to solve! Was it because _'Bad things always come in threes'?_ Fuck that noise.

But _no,_ of course not, because the universe(s) collectively hated Harry Evans and cackled in his face as he flew from one dumpster fire to the other. Apparently, the matter was much worse than he had assumed— the auxiliary vaults (which had been the main targets of theft) were very specific in their use, and it could mean either mild offence or ultimate disrespect to use the wrong one for the wrong purposes. Naturally, the ones Harry had trouble with were the most crucial ones: There was one _very full_ vault that his parents were meant to visit annually until death, which would then be passed on to him and his hypothetical siblings and a percentage added to the main vault, and the cycle would continue until it was emptied; there was another in which the _vassals_ of the family were meant to deposit money every twenty years, which could be withdrawn only with their own consent; and there was another that was supposed to just… _stay empty,_ perpetually, because who the fuck cared? Maybe it was a decoy for robbers, maybe it was because of _random-magical-tradition-whatever._ The point was— Harry had accidentally created a subtle network of grave mistakes.

_You opened this can of worms, Harry Evans,_ he whined to himself. _Now lie in it._

Fortunately, by starting the investigations _now,_ he had made sure that the blame wouldn’t fall to the Potters for “embezzling”(?) from their own vaults. (Could someone embezzle _themselves?_ Who even knew? Certainly not Harry, who had neither the authority nor the credentials to answer that.)

Just to vent his unique feelings of frustration, he groaned into the silence of his room and wiggled his tiny body side to side. There was something _very wrong_ with being a child again, something viscerally uncomfortable. Before he had reincarnated, Harry had been a (mostly) well-adjusted adult, able to moderate his reactions and aware of the world around him, understanding the connections between events and capable of making his conclusions without emotions thwarting his efforts.

Needless to say, all that development his brain had gone through was _mush_ now. Gone. Completely bananas. Harry was now a proper child, dumb and selfish and so self-absorbed he couldn’t see beyond a meter radius of himself—which actually wasn't that much of an exaggeration, what with his prescription glasses. Why hadn't he made it so wizards had a cure for eye ailments? Right, because _design choices._ He had wanted to see magical glasses so he had written eyes as _"extremel_ y delicate organs, only legendary wizards can heal myopia/hypermetropia/astigmatism/eye-stuff without fucking up some part of the brain". Good job, adult Harry. You did this world proud. Now every wizard was in danger of wearing glasses and losing them at crucial moments.

He was startled out of his thoughts by a knock at the door.

“Young Master? Will you eat in your room?”

“Um, sure!”

The maid entered and dragged a cart with her, laden to the brim with appetising dishes: Stir-fried vegetables with succulent prawns, glazed with dark red sauce and garnished with chives; peeled and sectioned grapefruits, oranges and lemon slices; for dessert, a finely-layered tiramisu. Truly, the only thing Harry had done right in this world was magic and food.

She placed the dishes on the nightstand and started cleaning up, hands lingering as if hesitant on certain shelves. With small flicks of her fingers, dust began to disappear in layers, releasing leftover smoke into the air.

Meanwhile, Harry examined his lunch with voracious regard. Everything looked and smelt incredibly mouthwatering— he was having a hard time trying to restrain himself from digging in. (Why he was, he didn’t even know. Anyone else would have devoured the whole meal by now.) He leaned in and sniffed long and longingly, imagining the paradise about to bloom on his tongue.

“Young Master, warming charms do not last _that_ long,” the maid warned him, still standing stiff in front of his bookcase with a spray bottle in her hand. _Um, do your job?? I’m savoring the fruits of my (theoretical) labor._

Harry rolled his eyes and finally took the fork in his hand, stabbing it into the biggest prawn, the red sauce dripping into the bone-white plate. The dark red _really_ didn’t suit the soft pink meat, so he gave it a _5/10_ from the presentation. Hopefully the taste would surpass that score.

He brought the fork into his mouth— 

The door banged open, making his fork drop to the floor. Shelly stood with an absolutely scary look in her face, chest heaving lightly and her free hand clenched tight.

“Shelly?” he said. The maid in his room flinched, staring at the spectacle. “I was about to eat—”

Shelly didn’t heed his words, stomping toward the maid. The girl flinched hard and stepped back, bumping into the bookcase and dropping the bottle in her hand. Something was wrong. There was a strange bubbling feeling in his chest, his arms buzzing with tense energy. Harry looked at the fork on the floor and felt shock set in as the dark red sauce ate through the carpet, sizzling over the white floorboards.

Oh.

“I didn’t know,” the maid he didn’t recognize denied, face pale and drenched in cold sweat. “Please, don’t hurt me— I’m loyal, I swear I’m loyal—”

Shelly silenced her with a swipe of her thumb and forefinger, the maid’s(?) mouth zipped shut. “Young Master, do not eat anything.”

“Just when I was actually hungry,” Harry said, still reeling from the death he avoided. Had he taken a bite, he might just be bare bones and nothing else.

Shelly, using only her hands and no wand, bound the (presumed) maid with magic and dumped her in front of him. “We have only a few choices.”

“I’m listening.”

“You are the temporary Lord of House Potter. This gives you the authority to order her execution, since she impersonated one of your personnel. Killing her immediately would give a message that assassins are unsuccessful. Another choice is interrogating her— but she might have a way to lie, even with magic aiding us.”

Holy shit. _Holy shit._ Could he order his maid to kill someone? Someone who tried to kill him? Could he let Shelly (possibly) torture a human being to get information? These decisions were those he wasn’t qualified to make, neither from an ethical nor pragmatic view.

On the other hand, his parents were on their way to death’s door, waiting to die because of his mistakes. Could choosing the cruel way save them?

“Do you…” He swallowed. “Do you have a way to get the truth out?”

Shelly looked at him with an empty expression, cold and calculating. He had never noticed just _how_ detached she looked without a smile or grimace. Her fingers tapped her thigh in periodic movements, mimicking an unheard melody. The maid’s whimpers filled the room while Mushel Riviera ruminated on his question.

“Possibly,” she spoke at last, the maid squealing in fright and wide, tearful eyes. Harry couldn’t look at her without his heart twisting, the sight so unfamiliar and unwanted that he wanted to leave the room. “I’ll send Maggie to make you lunch.” Shelly turned around and levitated the woman (whom Harry now _knew_ for certain that he had never seen in the manor,) leaving his bedroom and closing the door on her way out.

_Holy shit._

Harry slumped onto his chair, reviewing the last five minutes. Assassination attempt? Check. Infiltrators in his house? Check. Maid with ninja skills? _Check._ Who knew Shelly was so versatile?

This was too out of the norm for the genre his game was— okay, maybe _not_ that out of the genre, but certainly unexpected. Had the Gaunts finally tired of his meddling and… decided to finish the job?

He was _fucked._ Metaphorically and brutally. How could he defend against hired killers and sabotage with the meager(!) funds he had at his disposal? _He_ couldn’t hire a counter-assassin to counter-assassinate Morfin Gaunt, and he certainly couldn’t put his plan with Tom Riddle into action if he murdered the boy’s family.

Harry had— much to his own derision— realized that he sorely needed help. It hurt his pride, but pride was _nothing_ in the face of his parents’ potential demise. If he was to lower his head and beg on his knees for Tom Marvolo Riddle’s support, he would do so _gladly._ But first… he needed to find an opening; he had to find out how he could contact the boy without suspicion and consequences. And he needed it _fast,_ because evidently the Gaunts waited for no one.

There was also the implication of the Gaunts having spies in fucking _Gringotts_ of all places, which— fair, but also incredibly disadvantageous for him. If they could send murderers after him immediately after learning about the investigation, what else could they do to maintain the status quo?

The door was knocked and Harry jolted. “Who is it?”

“It’s me,” came Maggie’s voice, melting the wariness right out of him. “I’m coming in.”

“Please do. I’m about to explode from stress.”

The door opened to let her in; Maggie was carrying a tray of chicken noodle soup and sliced apples. Though it wasn’t as hearty as the previous meal (which lay abandoned on his nightstand) it looked just as appetizing to his empty stomach. He reclined back and in a fit of childishness, made grabby hands at the food, making the maid laugh.

“All yours,” she teased as she vanished the mess and replaced the lunch, the soup sloshing in the bowl as it landed. Harry immediately started shoveling spoonfuls in his mouth, not even waiting to swallow. “Slow down. You’re going to give yourself a stomach ache, Young Master.”

“Please don’t call me Young Master right now,” Harry pleaded, taking a breather from the soup. “I’ll die if I hear it one more time.”

She nodded slightly. “As you wish. Eat slowly.”

As Harry busied himself with the food, Maggie waited for him to finish. A comfortable yet weary silence descended on them, the _clinks_ and _twangs_ of the spoon on the silver bowl disturbing the quiet.

“It’s okay to feel after an ordeal,” Maggie told him mid-swallow. “Shelly likes to take action and prevent problems before more arise, but sometimes we are too scattered to think rationally.”

“Human condition, hallelujah.”

Maggie snorted and suppressed a wide grin. “Well, yeah. It’s very inconvenient, isn’t it? I know that you’d rather plan more than… eat soup and apples.”

“You’re underestimating the power of soup,” Harry snarked, waving his spoon in her direction. “Soup is comforting me more than you are now.”

“I’ll bet. I haven’t comforted someone in a long time. I think… the last time might have been when Lady Potter was pregnant with you,” she said, surprising him. Maggie saw his wide eyes and smiled. “Your health wasn’t very well in the womb. The healer thought that your mother might miscarry, actually. Things were stressful then, almost as stressful as right now.”

“Really? Was the birth difficult?”

“Very,” Maggie replied. “Lady Potter had to consult some unique people to make sure you would live. In the end, you were dropped in her arms and she looked the happiest she ever was. It was a miracle.”

Harry drew idle doodles in the broth, thoughtful after that tidbit of information. An infant with health problems, recovering without any issue? That was practically a protagonist origin story! Who could have helped the Potters? Could they function as a supporter?

The more he thought about it, however, the more he was convinced that it was inconsequential. Sure, a dramatic entrance might look interesting on paper, but it probably wouldn’t work well in reality. He discarded the idea and finished the last dregs of his soup.

“Now, let us talk,” Maggie declared and put the bowl back into the tray, levitating them out of the way. Was each one of his maids so overpowered? He never saw anyone else using magic without a wand, despite the laws saying that a mage can only receive one when seventeen-years-old.

“I was almost assassinated,” Harry delved into the core of the matter.

“Likely. Shelly is more experienced in these things, but I do know my way around a conspiracy. Whoever is behind this, probably isn’t very good at subterfuge. If you had died just then, it might have drawn attention to an external party.”

_Wow… roasting them without mercy. I like this._

“Children are always more emphasized in the media,” Maggie continued. “When a murder is announced, it brings less impact when the victim is an adult. Something terrible happening to a child is always horrifying, because everyone can agree that a child is innocent. There is no discussion of _deserving_ that pain, so it is unanimously agreed that whoever has committed the crime, will be condemned in the worst ways by even the scum of society— if only to protect their reputation.”

“Which is why the assassination attempt was badly thought out, right?” Harry asked, fascinated. He had always enjoyed mystery genres.

Maggie hummed thoughtfully. “More like they were reckless. They don’t care about the long-term consequences of their actions, which implies that they have enough funds for such impatient schemes. Whoever is serving them is probably draining their money faster than they can replace it. They do not have the time nor patience to see this cover-up through.” Maggie smiles then, genuinely and victoriously. “Harry, I’m saying this with confidence: We will save your parents.”

Harry swallowed around the lump in his throat, feeling indescribably hopeful. “Okay.”

“Now that that’s out of the way, there is the matter of getting their mercenaries to back off. We cannot pay them off, but we can provide other services.”

“Like what? Doesn’t everyone work for money?” Harry asked, feeling foolish immediately after. Ugh, being a child was the worst.

“In a way, yes. But most organizations in the underworld work toward a cause rather than for resources— though those are prevalent as well. Since this conspiracy is too big to be maintained by a small group, it’s probably one of the major ones. Let me see… I’d have suspected Crimson Flame, but they were disbanded years ago. It’s not Nag You’s modus operandi, no— must be… Gilded Door? They aren’t _that_ good at enchantments. It can’t be.”

To his surprise and disquiet, none of these names sounded familiar. The universe had obviously taken too many creative liberties with his game… 

Maggie’s eyes went wide. “Cold-blooded Women.”

“What?”

“It’s the only one that fits. Harry— sorry about this, but I should find Shelly.” She stood up, hesitating. “Don’t leave the room, okay? For my sake, please?”

“Depends. Are others assassins coming after me?”

“No, I’m pretty sure that’s done for today. If you need anything, please call for me or Flitwick.”

_Not Shelly? Is she gonna be busy decapitating the Gaunts— oh yeah, I told her to interrogate the assassin, fuck my fish memory._ “Pinky promise. Cross my heart, hope to die.”

Maggie raised her pinky and gave a mock-salute, leaving him alone in his room.

Harry let himself fall back into the mattress and thought, _I demand a raise._ He was severely discomfited by the fact that he wasn’t getting paid at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> alternate title: harry being oblivious and dense for exactly 2 hours

**Author's Note:**

> I've decided to say fuck you to word counts. Instructions unclear, updates erratic


End file.
